


until we get there

by starlightment



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Future, Angst, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Cute, F/M, Gay Keith (Voltron), Happy Ending, Healing, Hopeful Ending, Hurt Lance (Voltron), Hurt/Comfort, IF YOU WANT SOMETHING DONE RIGHT JUST DO IT YOURSELF YA'LL, Klance - Relationship - Freeform, M/M, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Pining Keith (Voltron), Post-Canon, Romance, Spoilers, a post-s8 pick me up, heavy s8 spoilers, klance, mentions of past allurance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-15
Updated: 2018-12-31
Packaged: 2019-09-18 11:38:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16994289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starlightment/pseuds/starlightment
Summary: Sometimes his mind is cruel. He’ll wake in the dead of night, drowning in his sweat, choking on his tears. He’ll clutch at old bedsheets until his knuckles fade to white. He’ll shiver in the darkness, and the light blue marks beneath his eyes will start to burn, and his lungs will heave, aching for a breath that just isn’t there.And sometimes Keith comes to visit.Those are the best days, Lance thinks.Those are the days when it’s easiest to breathe.---Or: Lance loses himself a little bit, but Keith is there to help him find it again.





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance tenses his jaw, but says nothing. Then he’s looking away, squinting into the deep-red horizon, and Keith watches as his freckles turn bronze. 
> 
> “I can see it, Lance. Every time I come here it’s like… you’re a little less yourself. A little less… bright. And it —” 
> 
> _It kills me, it kills me, it kills me,_ Keith’s mind chants desperately. 
> 
> “— it’s not what she would want for you,” he finishes instead. “I know it’s not.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> s8 happened. so i made this happen.

**. . .**

 

His days are marked by warm afternoon drizzles, the hazy glow of rose-gold sunsets, and sprawling green pastures that stretch across an endless horizon.

And it’s strange, he often thinks, how willingly he has stumbled into this way of life after everything they’ve been through. He stares up at the sky on cloudless nights, counting all the stars that he once knew so intimately. He sheds his soldier’s armor like a second skin, revealing all his fractures and scars, a frayed script of war. Days pass slowly now — the nights even _slower_ — and time is no longer measured by the galaxy’s wicked whim.

Sometimes he spends every waking hour outside, drenched in daylight. He’ll sit in the middle of the field. He’ll welcome the tickle of soft grass blades beneath his bare feet. He’ll grow drowsy to the sound of a whispering breeze, carrying with it the sweet scent of dew, and juniberrys, and _her_ , and he’ll say to himself: _this is enough._

Sometimes he believes it.

Sometimes his mind is cruel. He’ll wake in the dead of night, drowning in his sweat, choking on his tears. He’ll clutch at old bedsheets until his knuckles fade to white. He’ll shiver in the darkness, and the light blue marks beneath his eyes will start to burn, and his lungs will heave, aching for a breath that just isn’t there.

And sometimes Keith comes to visit.

Those are the best days, Lance thinks.

Those are the days when it’s easiest to breathe.

He’ll show up to the farmhouse in between missions with that small, tired grin on his lips — the one that has Mrs. McClain dragging him into the kitchen for a proper meal. Nadia and Sylvio swarm him like tiny gnats, demanding his attention, and demanding every single detail of his latest cool alien adventure. He’ll be ushered onto a threadbare couch, in front of a crackling fireplace, and his muscles will unfurl for the first time in weeks. His heart will dance like the flames before him, and feel so full that it threatens to spill over, and Keith will say to himself: _this is enough._

 _For right now, this is enough._  

And then Lance will come in from the backyard. His hair will be untidy, and he’ll look pale — paler than Keith remembers — but his lips will spread impossibly wide, splitting his entire face in two when his gaze falls on Keith. And then he’ll bound forward, crashing into him like a tidal wave. Lance will squeeze him, and Keith will squeeze back, and he’ll notice how the crook of his neck smells like freshly cut grass, and sunshine.

“Hey, man,” Lance will whisper. “Glad you could make it.”

“Yeah,” Keith will say in return, fingers curling into the back of Lance’s shirt. “Me, too.”

The dinner table is always booming and boisterous. They bombard Keith with questions about the relief efforts, and he answers them all with the calm, calculated patience that, sometimes, still feels as unfamiliar in his veins as a foreign language on his tongue.

“What’s new with you, Lance?” Keith eventually gets the chance to ask.

And Lance glances up slowly from his plate of half-eaten food, offering something almost secretive in his lopsided smile as he says, “Oh, y’know. Same old, same old.”

Keith just nods. 

Sometimes Lance brings him to the field, right as twilight fades to dusk. Keith with his legs stretched out in front of him, and Lance with his back pressed against Kaltenecker’s belly as she lazes beneath the setting sun. Keith loses track of how long they’ve been out here, talking circles around the very topic that still nips at Lance’s raw edges. But then the stars start to glow overhead, and the crickets start to sing in the distance, and Keith speaks so low that he can barely be heard over the melancholy chorus.

“Lance,” he says. “What are you doing?”

The absent-minded _scritch-scratch_ of fingernails behind the cow’s ear comes to a harrowing halt.

“I’m sharing a private moment with Kaltenecker, obviously. Which you’re _totally_ ruining, by the way,” Lance huffs in amusement, burying his face against the animal’s snout. “Isn’t that right, gorgeous? Pay no mind to our broody third-wheel —”

“Lance,” Keith says again, more solemn. “I mean… what are you doing — _here_?”

Lance goes rigid, his entire body bristling when the sweeping undercurrent of Keith’s words registers inside his head.

“I’m living my life, Keith,” he answers flatly.

“Are you?”

His blue gaze burns, cutting through what’s left of the dim sunlight, and Keith’s own eyes pin him there, unrelenting.

“I’m home. I’m with my family,” Lance says with bite. “What more do I need?”

Keith barely recognizes his own voice as his lips give way to a very blunt, very succinct, “Happiness.” 

Lance tenses his jaw, but says nothing. Then he’s looking away, squinting into the deep-red horizon, and Keith watches as his freckles turn bronze.

“I can see it, Lance. Every time I come here it’s like… you’re a little less yourself. A little less… _bright_. And it —”

 _It kills me, it kills me, it kills me,_ Keith’s mind chants desperately. 

“— it’s not what she would want for you,” he finishes instead. “I know it’s not.” 

The grass rustles and Kaltenecker stirs as Lance shifts around, throwing his wild, red-rimmed eyes on Keith with a snap of his neck. His long lashes gleam, coated with dampness, and Keith’s hands twitch with the impulse to reach out, and wipe them dry.

“Quit acting like you know _anything_ , Keith,” Lance snarls with a viciousness that one can only learn in the frontlines of war. “You’re not in charge anymore. You’re not in charge of Voltron, and you’re sure as _hell_ not in charge of _me_.”

Keith holds his breath as Lance’s shoulders immediately collapse in on themselves. Regret? Pain? Keith used to be able to tell the difference.

“It’s — over,” Lance rasps weakly, gaze falling into his lap. Small tears dapple the worn denim of his jeans, and Keith feels that knowing simmer at the tips of his fingers. “It’s all over.” 

Keith’s thoughts have drifted elsewhere by the time Lance clamps down on the tremble of his bottom lip. He thinks about all the time that has passed — far too long for any heart to bear the painful burden of loss. He thinks about all the emails that bounce between the paladins — all the unanswered ones that probably still sit in Lance’s inbox. He thinks about all the sleepless nights. All the ones that Keith has missed. All the times Lance must wake up alone and afraid, and all the times Keith should’ve been there to chase away the nightmares. 

“We all miss Allura. You most of all. I get that,” he says at last.

Her name has Lance’s eyelids fluttering to a close.

“But just know that I —” Keith pauses, catching himself, and pointedly amends, “— we miss _you_ , too.”

And, really, that’s all it takes for Lance to break, to crumble like he’s been on the brink of shattering for longer than he lets on. When his eyes creak open once again, they’re as glossy as polished moonstone, and the tears run hot and heavy over the round pinkness of his cheeks.

“I’m scared,” he admits, a shivering whimper into the quiet of nighttime. “I’m scared that one day I’m gonna wake up and… forget how it feels to love her.” 

Lance gasps for air, but his lungs still feel empty.

“And I can’t —” he sobs into his wet palm. “—I can’t _do_ that to her —”

And then it’s the urgent curl of fingers around his wrist as Keith pulls his hand away from his tear-stained face, and the frantic patter of Lance’s heartbeat as both of their palms lay flat against his broad chest, one atop the other, solid and warm.

“You won’t forget,” Keith tells him so firmly that it sounds like a promise. “It’s a part of who you are.”

Lance stares, lips parted, heart still pounding.

Keith’s gaze suddenly goes honey-like, seeping into every crevice and crack that Lance has yet to stitch up, and he adds, soft, “But it’s not _all_ you are.” 

All at once, like the sun finally sinking beneath the skyline, Lance melts into him. He lunges forward, wobbly limbs be damned, and clings so mightily that Keith almost topples onto his back. He sways, steadying their conjoined weight, and then he’s surrounding him, going lightheaded from that earthy, Lance-like scent again.

Keith holds him until he stops trembling. Until he’s certain that the stars will burn out, and the sun will start to rise anew. Until the silence rings in his ears, and he’s muttering, so low that it rumbles in his ribcage:

“Come with me.”

Lance stiffens, and pulls away from the side of Keith’s neck with a dazed, “What?”

“Come with me, Lance. With the Blades. We can always use the extra help,” says Keith.

But Lance just shakes his head, overwhelmed. “I don’t —”

“I want you with me,” and the realization of it has Lance shivering again. Keith can feel it where his arms are still wound around his waist. “You need to get back out there. You need to start flying again, Lance, you were _born_ to fly.”

“Right,” Lance sniffs, dabbing his nose with the back of his hand. “I know it’s been a while, but don’t get it twisted, dude. _You’ve_ always been the prodigy around here.” 

As if calling out in response, a proud, animal-like roar ripples through the catacombs of Lance’s chest, distant yet bone-deep, and he heeds the cry, back straightening.

Keith smirks. “Red doesn’t seem to agree.”

“She’s here?” Lance whispers, perhaps on the verge of tears again.

“Of course. She wouldn’t pass up the opportunity to see you again,” and then, a chuckle. “You know how she gets.”

They wander across the field, back to where Keith had landed earlier. He leads Lance by the hand, fingers woven together, and neither even bothering to question it. And when Lance spots her up ahead, in all her bright, brazen glory, Keith can hear him gasp, and he can feel his grip squeeze tighter. Lance’s blood is boiling with excitement, no doubt, as he picks up the pace until he’s charging forward, past Keith, making a straight shot for Red’s giant paw. 

A short, incredulous laugh bubbles up his throat, and hiccups right past his lips as he splays his palms over her smooth crimson exterior. “Hey, girl,” he greets. “Lookin’ good.”

Red lets loose a ferocious growl, eyes glowing to life like twin moons, and then she’s lowering her head, inviting him into her enormously gaping maw.

And Lance doesn’t need to be coaxed before his legs are taking off, sprinting up the ramp, and barreling into the cockpit where the color red tints everything before his eyes. She’s thrumming with life, and Lance feels it, even now, like a second pulse. Her dashboard blinks and flickers, beckons him closer.

“You should do the honors,” Keith’s voice comes up from behind, following him into the cockpit, and motioning toward the pilot’s chair.

Lance blinks, dumbfounded. “You sure?”

“Positive.” 

Red’s controls burn beneath Lance’s grip, strong and omnipotent, just like they used to whenever they’d chase down the stars or glide along endless streams of nebula, as if the galaxy were their own glittering playground. He pushes his hands forward, and Red gives a sudden jerk that has Lance yelping in surprise, and Keith staggering to the side.

“Shit, Lance —”

“I know, I know, _sorry_ — just a little rusty,” he groans, and then, softer, only for Red, “Easy, girl, easy.” 

Something settles, then. A soothing prickle ghosting along his surface, pebbling his skin down to his toes. Red obeys, purring quietly, and straightens to her full height.

“So,” grins Keith, kneeling beside the pilot’s chair. “Where to, sharpshooter?”

“Let’s just ride,” Lance says. “And see where she takes us.”

Adrenaline plummets into his stomach as Red shoots off the ground. Lance’s back presses into the leather upholstery of the pilot’s chair, and the world disappears below them in a shadowy blur, and Keith is _here_ by his side, right where he belongs, right where he hopes he’ll stay, and Lance says to himself: _this is enough._

And this time, with great certainty, he believes it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> title from "until we get there" by lucius. 
> 
> keep your chins up, lovelies. <3 
> 
>  
> 
> [TUMBLR](http://starlightments.tumblr.com/)   
>  [TWITTER](http://twitter.com/starlightment)


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At that, Lance’s grin spreads impossibly wider, and it goes straight to Keith’s thrashing gut. “You laughing at me, Kogane?” he demands delightedly. 
> 
> “I didn’t laugh.” 
> 
> “Yeah, but you’re doing that _thing_. That _Keith_ thing,” he says. His hands are stuffed into the pockets of his worn jeans, and his freckles are burning bronze, and he’s strolling backwards with slow, easy strides. Effortlessly handsome. “Where you clam up, and _almost_ smile, but your eyes are basically in hysterics. Usually at _my_ expense. Just gonna throw that in there.” 
> 
> An unforeseen chuckle bubbles up from the back of Keith’s throat, and falls off his lips. He wasn’t aware he had any things. He wasn’t aware that Lance _notices_ his things. 
> 
> “Then I guess I’m laughing at you,” he smirks. And then — because he’s Keith, and he’s Lance, and this is _them_ — he says, “What’re you gonna do about it?”

**. . .**

 

Admittedly, Keith doesn’t know which planet they’ve landed on. Their exact coordinates are probably locked into Red’s navigational system — somewhere in the Javeeno star system, maybe. About a few vargas away from Arus and the Zorlar astroid belt, give or take. Keith doesn’t know.

But he _does_ know that it’s relatively small, and, for as far as the eye can see, uninhabited. There are oddly pink-tinged clouds floating overhead, framing a golden lit horizon as it glistens off the swelling shoreline to his right. It’s reminiscent of the beaches on Earth, only brighter, somehow. Like someone sprinkled bits of starlight onto the ocean’s rippling surface, and into the opalescent granules of sand that stick to his toes as he walks along the water’s edge, lapping waves rolling up to his ankles, and then receding. Warm like summer rain.

And up ahead, Lance is splashing through the shallow surf with his arms outstretched, his head lolled back to really _feel_ the sunshine, and the gentle salty breeze as it whips through his hair, making it go curly and unkempt. And then he’s charging toward a flock of purple-beaked, seagull-like creatures until they disperse, scattering through the air like a plume of billowing smoke, and Lance is laughing so loud that it ricochets off the clouds, and the sea, and Keith’s throbbing heartstrings.

And then Lance is whirling around, clumsy with mirth, and smiling so radiantly in Keith’s direction that he’s certain he’ll go blind from it. And Lance is all sun-kissed, and windswept, and alive, and _happy_ , just the way he should be. 

And, really — what else is there to know?

Lance squints into the blaring sunlight, and says something, but Keith doesn’t hear it over the roar of a crashing wave.

“What?” he calls out.

“I _said_ ,” Lance repeats, raising his volume to a shout, “I love it here!”

Keith’s mouth tilts crooked, quietly endeared. “Couldn’t tell.”

At that, Lance’s grin spreads impossibly wider, and it goes straight to Keith’s thrashing gut. “You laughing at me, Kogane?” he demands delightedly.

“I didn’t laugh.”

“Yeah, but you’re doing that _thing_. That _Keith_ thing,” he says. His hands are stuffed into the pockets of his worn jeans, and his freckles are burning bronze, and he’s strolling backwards with slow, easy strides. Effortlessly handsome. “Where you clam up, and _almost_ smile, but your eyes are basically in hysterics. Usually at _my_ expense. Just gonna throw that in there.”

An unforeseen chuckle bubbles up from the back of Keith’s throat, and falls off his lips. He wasn’t aware he had any things. He wasn’t aware that Lance _notices_ his things.

“Then I guess I’m laughing at you,” he smirks. And then — because he’s Keith, and he’s Lance, and this is _them_ — he says, “What’re you gonna do about it?”

It takes all but two seconds before Lance has his arms around Keith’s waist, and they’re flailing together, and falling together, and then Lance manages to wrestle him into the lukewarm surf, and they’re tangled, and laughing breathlessly into each other’s faces, and soaked from head to toe.

 

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Later, when the strange, alien sun has disappeared, and they’re sitting shoulder-to-shoulder on the top of Red’s enormous skull, staring out at the dark, quivering ocean that looks like it could swallow them whole, Keith asks, “So have you given any thought to what I said? About the Blades?”

And Lance goes rigid at his side, like maybe this moment is too delicate for that right now. Like maybe it’s making their little piece of wonderful shatter like fragile sea glass. But that’s nothing new. Keith has always had an unfortunate knack for breaking things. 

“Yeah,” says Lance. And then, softer, “A little. Kinda.”

Keith waits. He waits, and waits, until he fears that something inside his chest might burst. He waits until he can feel Lance’s hand inching toward his own, fingertips brushing, and just that gentle, barely-there touch is enough to steady them both.

“I think I need to go back, Keith,” Lance whispers, eyes still pinned out into the distance, watching nothing.

“Why?” Keith says at once. “Why do you _need_ to?”

Lance fidgets. His fingertips twitch so close to Keith’s. “Just because, okay?”

“Lance —”

“Look,” he turns, finally, flashing a full glimpse of his gaze, gone deep blue and endless with nightfall. “I know you’re worried about me or whatever, but… I dunno. Don’t be.”

Keith shakes his head, frowning. “You can’t ask me to do that.”

“Well, you can’t ask _me_ to just walk away from _everything_ ,” Lance says firmly. “I can’t just pick up and leave, y’know? I’m not like that. I’m not like…”

“Like me.”

It happens like a devastating blow, swift and bone-deep. It shivers in the silence. It gets lost in the space between their dark, unblinking eyes, but it echos in their ears, sparking something with the strength of a wildfire.

Lance mutters, “I didn’t say that.”

“No. But it’s true,” Keith mutters back, drawing his knees into his chest. “I do leave. When things get —”

_Big. Too much. Terrifying._

“Maybe,” offers Lance. “But you always come back. When it counts.”

Keith just shrugs, remembering the past like it sits lightyears away from where they are now. “Voltron needed me. The whole universe needed me.”

“I need you, too.” 

When he feels that warmth — filling his cracks, making him whole — Keith looks down at where their hands are now slotted together, fingers loosely laced, and he breathes a quiet, “Oh.”

And something about it makes Lance shrink, just a bit, even while his hand stays still and diligent. “Sorry,” he half-laughs. Nervous. “Was that weird to say? It was probably a little weird, right? I’m just… I dunno, man. All I know is that things are better when you’re around.”

Keith glances up, blinking once.

“That was pretty weird, too, huh?”

Then Keith starts to grin. “No,” he answers truthfully.

In the dim, sunless evening, Lance’s face glows. First pink, just atop the cheekbones, and then cyan from the marks that flank the corners of his eyes. Keith idly wonders if Lance is even aware that it’s happening; if he can even feel it burning under his skin the way it burns straight through to every fibre of Keith’s being.

“So I was thinking —” Lance goes on, recovering sooner than Keith. “— I mean, maybe we could… make this a regular thing? You coming to visit. Going on little day-trip adventures. Y’know. For our _souls_. For mental health or whatever. Once a week? Once a month? Anything works. I’m pretty flexible. You’re the one out there helping entire civilizations with your intergalactic peace corps buddies, so I don’t wanna be too presumptuous or anything —”

“Let’s do it.”

“I — really?”

“Yes, really,” Keith says softly. “I want to keep seeing you.”

Lance lifts a playful brow, unable to resist. “Oh, so we’re _seeing_ each other now?”

Keith ducks his head out of sight. “Quit — making it weird.”

“Hey,” whispers Lance, and he gives Keith’s hand a squeeze. “I wanna see you, too.”

 _Then that’s what we’ll do._ It hangs in the air, unspoken but heard.

 

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“It’s not a goodbye,” Keith tells him, with vehemence, as he walks Lance to the front door of the farmhouse. It’s late, and only a mere dwindling porch lamp lights the way for them.

Lance doesn’t reach for the doorknob. He scuffs his shoe against the old, splintering wood beneath his feet, and mumbles to the ground, “It feels like one.”

“It’s not,” Keith tells him again.

“But, hey, silver lining?” Lance says, trying to inject his tone with as much lightheartedness as possible, and missing by a mile. “At least I’ve gotten pretty used to ‘em by now.”

“Lance,” Keith’s voice rumbles. “I’ll be back.”

“Yeah, yeah. I know.”

They reach for each other at the same time, a little rough, a little unpracticed, and a little too desperate for something that’s not supposed to be a goodbye. But they hold tight, limbs aching, hearts stammering, and Keith with his nose steeped in sweet-smelling chestnut curls around Lance’s ear.

 _He could kiss him like this._ He could drift an inch or two, and catch his lips, but he snuffs out the thought.

As Keith turns away, trekking back across the field to where Red is aglow and waiting, he hears, “Hey, Kogane.”

He pivots back around.

Lance is leaning against the porch post, arms crossed, grinning something easy and so utterly Lance that it makes Keith’s breath hitch. “You better treat my girl right, you hear me? She doesn’t need some hotshot pilot out there denting her up.”

“She survived a couple years with _you_ , didn’t she?” Keith flings back, smirking, and starts jogging up Red’s ramp.

Lance offers up his middle finger in response, and crows, “Miss you already, asshole!” 

And as Keith settles into the pilot’s chair, hands on the controls that are still slightly warm and thrumming from Lance’s grasp, he can still see Lance, dozens of feet below him, still grinning like he’s lit from within. And Keith thinks about that smile as Red ascends — how he’d move mountains, and shake galaxies just to put it there. Just to _keep_ it there.

 _And so that’s what he’ll do._ Unspoken but heard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [TUMBLR](http://starlightments.tumblr.com/)   
>  [TWITTER](http://twitter.com/starlightment)


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